


So Much More

by crescendohno



Category: Captain Marvel (2019), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: (if one assumes that carol and maria were together as i do), Canon Compliant, Captain Marvel (2019) Spoilers, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Lesbian Carol Danvers, Monica and her 2 moms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 08:05:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18149270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crescendohno/pseuds/crescendohno
Summary: It starts with her eyes. It continues with her heart. It ends with her name.And then it begins again.





	So Much More

**Author's Note:**

> i've seen the movie twice and this fic absolutely had to be done!!

It starts with her eyes. And her lips. A twinkle from across the room and the lift of her brow. The pull of her mouth, saying without words _‘can you believe this guy?’_

Maria grabs her drink and drifts towards the other end of the bar as if she’s being pulled - and maybe she is; Carol’s gaze is like the tides. When Maria settles in the booth, Carol’s smirk broadens into a grin that she hides behind the neck of her beer bottle.

“Anyone tell you it’s impolite to stare?” Maria asks.

Carol chews at her bottom lip. “Maybe once or twice.” She nods back towards the bar. Back to the guy with the rattail who’d been inching his stool closer and closer to Maria’s all night. “But I thought you might want some better company.” 

“And you think you’re better?”

“Oh, much better. I’ll even buy you the next round before I try to get to second base,” Carol says with a wink. She tilts her head back and downs the rest of her beer.

Maria knows she’s in trouble.

***

It continues with her heart. Right there on her sleeve. For anyone to see, but only Maria’s to have.

Maria’s and maybe Monica’s, too.

To Monica, she’s Auntie Carol and they’re thick as thieves from nearly the moment Maria introduces Carol to her daughter. Monica looks at Carol with stars in her eyes, and Carol looks back at her with entire galaxies, the universe.

They’re lying on their backs in the grass of Maria’s backyard, Monica asleep and snuggled between them. Carol sighs and turns her head to Maria, and she looks satisfied, content. Maria feels that, too. She shifts to free her hand from under Monica’s shoulder and reaches over to lace her fingers with Carol’s.

“Think it’ll be like this forever?” Carol asks as she lazily traces circles on the back of Maria’s hand with her thumb.

Maria doesn’t answer for a moment. She looks up at the moon, half-hidden behind the clouds. 

“Nah,” she says. “Only gonna get better.” Even in the dark, Maria can see Carol’s eyes crinkle. She unlinks their hands and gently pulls Carol’s face closer by the hinge of her jaw. “Much better,” Maria says, leaning in for a kiss.

Being with Carol is easy, natural. It’s like breathing or her heart beating. She doesn’t need to think about it. She doesn’t need to doubt or worry, because everything that Carol is bubbles just under the surface and spills out into her every action.

Maria feels Carol smile against her lips, and she moves to kiss her cheek and chin and wherever else she can reach given their awkward angle. They only stop when Monica begins to grumble and rub at her eyes. Carol laughs then, loud and sweet against the night.

“Time for bed, Lieutenant Trouble!” Carol stands up and lifts Monica high off the ground, twirling her around and then bringing her in close. Monica giggles and burrows her face in the side of Carol’s neck. “Yeah, you are sleepy, I think,” Carol says, softer this time, rubbing up and down Monica’s back.

Watching them disappear into the house, Maria wonders what ‘much better’ will feel like if _this_ is now.

In the morning, Maria stretches across the empty bed. Even when she stays over, Carol is always up at an obscene hour. Maria takes her time; she finishes the chapter of the book she was reading the night before, she showers, she dresses, she grabs a glass of sweet tea from the fridge, and she heads out into the yard.

As she expected, Carol and Monica are out by the shed, already up for hours no doubt. They’re in the cockpit of an old biplane Maria bought at an auction for a steal some months ago. Monica is wearing Carol’s worn leather jacket and a pair of goggles, her braided hair in two little buns on either side of her head. Carol sits behind her, smile brighter than the rising sun.

“Okay, Lieutenant Trouble,” Carol says, “tell me what to do.”

“We gotta catch the bad guys, Auntie,” Monica responds in between making engine noises with her mouth and reaching up to flip imaginary switches.

“Damn right, we do!”

Maria snorts. Even when it’s only pretend, Carol is fierce in the air. Testing planes, flying as her co-pilot - it’s a feeling like nothing Maria has ever felt. It’s wild. It’s where they belong. She closes her eyes and she’s in the air, her heartbeat quick and the mask tight around her face. Carol’s voice coming in staticky over the comm system, _“Higher, further, faster, baby!”_

“Oh, and so much more,” Maria says to herself, bringing her glass of tea to her lips.

***

It ends with her name. A charred piece of metal. They tell Maria it’s all that’s left of her.

But that’s not true.

Maria sits at her dining room table, clothes, pictures, books, and boxes and boxes of more of them spread out around her. Monica is on the sofa, curled up around one of Carol’s old Air Force shirts. She’d cried herself to exhaustion. Maria is past that point. 

Carol didn’t get along with her family. She always said Maria and Monica were her family whenever it was brought up. So, it was Maria who received all of Carol’s personal effects from the base. It was Maria who packed up Carol’s apartment, brought it all back home - where it should have been in the first place, but they still had to be careful.

And she still can’t believe it. 

Every day, every minute since she was handed that dog tag, Maria is at war with herself. To accept this, to move on the best she can? To dig deeper, to keep asking questions until she gets an answer - a real one? Either is impossible. She can’t let go of Carol any more than she can tear her own heart from her chest. And she can’t bear to hope. She’s been debriefed and dismissed. All of her questions have been met with the same answer: _classified_. She may never know what happened and that crushes her. Rips her apart.

But somewhere in between moving on and finding out, Maria holds on to all of Carol’s things. She puts the pictures on the mantle, puts Carols’s dress blues in the closet by her own, puts her tapes by the stereo. It’s their home, and Maria makes sure to keep it that way.

***

And then, impossibly, miraculously, it begins again.

Her eyes are far away, unfocused and all of that passion and zeal she wore so prominently is bundled up within her and she calls herself Vers.

But it’s her. It’s Carol.

They can change her, take away her memories, but they can’t keep her down.

Maria runs the back of her hand down the side of Carol’s cheek, tangles her fingers in her hair, and Carol leans into it and forward to rest their foreheads together.

“You’re Carol Danvers,” Maria says, voice strong through her tears. “And you are so much more.”


End file.
